flume
/fluːm/
"flume" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“flume” has 7 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #36,562. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #36,562
- frequency rank, English
- 2,507
- “F” headwords
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A ravine or gorge, usually one with water running through.
Corpus desk
Index EN-flume · flume · English
flume · rank #36,562 · 7 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-MID #36,562
- LEN-MID 5 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-MID 7 variants
- BOOK-MID 2,507
- PHOTO-FINISH flowered
Nearest frequency peer: flowered (-1 rank slots)
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Rank peers near misspelling magnet “flume”
Same rarity band: useful when a typo lands on a peer headword
- fiscally
fiscally
63,442 corpus weight
- fjord
fjord
63,441 corpus weight
- flowered
flowered
63,440 corpus weight
- flume
flume
63,439 corpus weight
- flyover
flyover
63,438 corpus weight
- focussing
focussing
63,437 corpus weight
What this shows “flume” sits among these FrequencyWords peers; misspelling depth is tracked separately in the edit-distance chart.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | flume |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /fluːm/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #36,562 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency seat of misspelling magnet “flume”
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 7 spelling variants around flume (IPA /fluːm/), anoun. Corpus frequency is #36,562 among 2,507 “F” headwords. Wiktionary lists 2 senses, so context still picks the gloss.
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for flume, with forms such as "fflume", "fllume", and "flmue". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "fuse", "flux", "fume", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English flum, from Old French flum, flun, from Latin flumen, from fluere (“to flow”). The correct English form is flume, spelled F-L-U-M-E.
Definition
- 1A ravine or gorge, usually one with water running through.
- 2An open channel or trough used to direct or divert liquids, especially to carry materials (logs, mined material, etc) or people (as a water slide), especially (but not always) one where the walls are raised above the surrounding terrain rather than recessed like a ditch.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how flume appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Near the upper end of the portage the river falls 100 feet in as many rods, the water going at lightning speed through a natural flume in the rock. So rapid is the descent that the water in the flume is but 3 feet deep. We named this the "Devil's Slide."
[...] the flumes are generally not dark rides and they run much faster. Two notable exceptions are the Timber Mountain[…]
Etymology
From Middle English flum, from Old French flum, flun, from Latin flumen, from fluere (“to flow”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as:
- fflume
- fllume
- flmue
- fluem
- flumme
- fulme
- lfume
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of flume - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "flume", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).
Similar misspelling depth
Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (7 here; floor ≥5).